And Noah was six hundred years old when the flood of waters was on the earth.
Genesis 7:6 fixes the flood to a single point in one man's life: the year he turned six hundred. That small line of chronology marks the end of God's patience with a whole world. It raises two questions: what filled those six hundred years, and why the record changes its tone right here.
A Life Divided
Most of Noah's six hundred years pass without a headline. One writer weighs how little the record says about the first four-fifths of that span:
When Noah was born, over a thousand years had passed since sin entered the world, at the lowest estimate. Six hundred years later the flood would sweep away the world of the ungodly. Divide those six hundred years into five equal parts. Four of the five passed with nothing put on record except the all-important fact that he was "a righteous man, blameless in his generation," and that he "walked with God."
That quiet stretch was not wasted time. It was the groundwork for the final fifth:
Four-fifths of the period passed with little happening. Yet during those years this steady walk with God laid the foundation for the activity and the witness of the final fifth — the one hundred and twenty years just before the flood. That was the period when "God's patience waited … while the ark was being prepared" (1 Peter 3:20), and also of the witness Noah gave as "a herald of righteousness" (2 Peter 2:5).
The Hundred and Twenty Years
Those closing years were not just construction time. The ark itself preached, plank by plank:
Is not this same care for His people seen in the long respite granted to the people before the flood? Here we see the longsuffering of God, who bore long with the sinners before the flood and gave them room for repentance. Every day that Noah worked at the ark, every plank, every nail, every stroke of his hammer, was a warning and a threat of the coming judgment. More than that, God could do nothing until Noah was safe in the ark, after He Himself had shut him in. Even then there was a respite of seven days (perfect forbearance).
Noah himself worked without knowing the deadline. One writer draws attention to what God withheld:
The Lord God had fixed 120 years as the term of His longsuffering. Noah's preaching, as well as ark-building, was to be for that period. Such was the purpose of God. But Noah was told nothing of this appointed interval. The Lord kept back all mention of the 120 years.
Why The Name Of God Changes Here
The opening of Genesis 7 says "the LORD," while this verse and the ones after it say "God." One writer reads that change as a move from private favour to public judgment:
The general statement that follows in verses 6-10 confirms the special force of these five verses all the more. There "God" appears rather than Jehovah, and so nothing of moral relationship in particular. Here we have Noah's age when the flood came — six hundred years — and the entrance of himself and all his house into the ark… He who enjoyed the favour of Jehovah had the earlier communication in grace. Nobody could fail to be aware of God's judgment when it came.
The same writer treats the change of names as evidence of design rather than of stitched-together documents:
The theory of Elohistic and Jehovistic documents so fails to account for the use of the divine names, as well as the other features of the text… From verse 6 we have Noah's action in view of Elohim's word as such, where accordingly the entrance of the creatures, clean or unclean, two and two, is named as in Genesis 6; and all the more strikingly here, because in the earlier verses the clean by sevens had been commanded by Jehovah, as suited His dealings with His own.
A Date You Can Check
The record does not stop at Noah's age. A few verses later it gives the day itself:
In verse 11 God gives the date of the beginning of the flood in relation to the age of Noah. He gives not only the general time, but the exact day: the 17th day of the second month, in Noah's 600th year. The many dates, names and places recorded in Scripture are an invitation to anyone to check the accuracy of the word of God as he pleases.
The Pattern Repeats
One writer reads Noah as a picture of every believer, and Noah's day as a picture of ours. What made Noah look foolish was how long normal life had lasted:
Noah pictures the believer in general, as one who flees to Christ for refuge from the wrath to come… There is a sense in which the whole time of gospel witness matches Noah's days… It was the long stretch of undisturbed prosperity that made the builder of the ark look like a fool to those whose day was nearly over. In the same way we are warned that the Destroyer will appear when men begin to think that peace and safety are about to crown a world whose earlier generations have seen such strange changes.
Summary
- Walk first. Four-fifths of Noah's six hundred years hold no recorded event. The record says only that he was righteous and walked with God. That hidden walk carried the visible work.
- Then witness. The last hundred and twenty years turned that walk into building and preaching. Every hammer stroke was a warning to those who watched.
- Patience has a term. God fixed the length of His longsuffering but never told Noah the number. The builder worked by obedience, not by countdown.
- Then the name changes. From this verse on the record says "God" rather than "Jehovah." Grace had spoken in private. Judgment now lands where no one could miss it.
- And it dates itself. Noah's six hundredth year, second month, seventeenth day. The date is precise enough to check, and the pattern will return.